Occupy Movement Will Not Be Silenced or Stopped

For Immediate Release

Occupy Movement Will Not Be Silenced or Stopped

Statement of Robert Weissman, President, Public Citizen

WASHINGTON - Occupy Wall Street has helped focus national attention on the crucial problems of our day: unchecked corporate power that chokes our economy and democracy, rising inequality that betrays the basic promise of America, joblessness when there’s work to be done, foreclosures that displace families and leave houses empty, and much more.

The hardy bands of Occupy protesters in New York and around the country have fundamentally altered the national conversation – and not just in the media. Political and campaign discourse has changed.

The Occupy movement already has done more to help this country than anyone could reasonably have imagined. But it’s just getting started. The movement won’t be deterred by eviction efforts in New York or Portland or Oakland or St. Louis or Nashville or anywhere else. “We are the 99 percent” is not a call that can be so easily silenced, nor a movement that can be stopped.

Public Citizen salutes, celebrates and supports Occupy Wall Street and the Occupy movement. We call on people to participate in the Nov. 17 day of action that marks the two-month anniversary of Occupy Wall Street, and will now serve to demonstrate the lasting and growing strength of a movement.

###

Public Citizen is a national, nonprofit consumer advocacy organization founded in 1971 to represent consumer interests in Congress, the executive branch and the courts.

Further

Almost everyone hates Indiana's egregious "religious freedom" law - cue fierce backlash from businesses, churches, states, cities, legal experts and unhateful Hoosiers - but the most creative response came from an enterprising libertarian who delightedly used his new religious freedom to found the First Church of Cannabis - "One Toke, One Smile, One Love" - aimed at "celebrating all that is good in our hearts." His goal: "A House of Hemp Built with Love," and presumably lots of munchies.